FiiO i1 Portable DAC and Amplifier for Apple Lightning Port with Built-in Microphone and IOS Remote Controls for IPHONE/IPAD/IPOD

I am a self described audiophile and use Shure SE846’s as my daily commute IEM’s. For the longest time I refused to adopt a new iPhone because they removed the headphone jack and I didn’t want to use the apple provided lighting to 3.5mm adapter because it was a waste of my headphones. I looked for a long time for a lightning based DAC but never found one that was the right size or had low/no noise during playback.Eventually I had to move to a new phone and have reluctantly been using apple AirPods until I finally found this item. It was low cost and had fairly good reviews - plus FiiO makes a pretty good DAC - so why not?Damn am I impressed. It worked immediately, produced no audible hiss nor introduced any perceptible noise to my audio. The sound reproduction is great and the power it provides to my IEM’s is better than the direct connection to a phone with a 3.5mm jack.The only downsides so far?1) The cylinder form factor with the buttons is a little slippery and finding the buttons still isn’t natural2) The cord is actually longer than I expected. Though it has a cable manager built in (nice) it makes my overall cable length a little unruly. I realize, though, that complaining about too much cable is a dumb thing because usually we are all complaining about too *short* of a cable - so good on FiiO for the thought.TL;DR : Totally worth the $30, don’t regret it a bit. Great sound and nice small powered DAC.

While I was impressed by the sound quality, this adapter makes it almost impossible to make phonecalls or do voice commans. The inline mic and controlls on your headset are disabled and you need to use a new pair that are built into the DAC. However since the DAC unit itself is attacked like an extension cord to your headset, meaning that it is going to be dangling far away from your head. Even if you use clips to attach it up top my your head, which greatly reduces cable length, good luck having anyone hear you. Half the time im told my mic is muffled or flat out dosent work. I do not reccomend this product.

When Apple dropped the conventional headphone jack in favor of the Lightning connector they created a dilemma for users. Do you go to Bluetooth? Do you use Apple's adapter (no longer supplied free). Or, do you buy headphones the can connect to the Lightning port? Each has its strengths and weaknesses.Bluetooth is great, but it is not an audiophile medium. Also, Apple has refused to implement Qualcom's aptX Bluetooth protocol. The best Bluetooth so far.Apples adapter is only about $10US. It is more than just an adapter from Lightning to a standard headphone jack. It actually contains a digital to analog converter chip and an analog be to digital chip (to make the microphone work). The new iPhones, in addition to dropping the jack also removed the high quality DAC chips that were in older phones. The chips are microscopic and are in the body of the Lightning connector.Some high quality headphones and ear buds are available with their own DAC's that can plug into the iPhone directly. They are all very well, but they don't plug into anything else.This device by FiiO attempts to do a couple of things. First, it contains a higher quality DAC and an amplifier. It then allows you to connect your favorite conventional headphones to the iPhone.It also has all the remote controls for the phone and a microphone so you can receive calls. It succeeds fairly well at this. However, it will not drive higher impedance phones and the microphone volume is a little low. The Fiio DAC is much better than the Apple adapter.For those that don't know FiiO, they are a Chinese company that has made quite a name for itself in producing very high quality digital music players, headphone amplifiers and DAC's. This device, with the limitations mentioned above does an excellent job and is worthwhile considering.One or two other caveats. The cord is too long. You don't need a a long cord especially if your phones have a decent length cord themselves. It draws power from the phone, but very little. The cord may not be a durable as it should be. No problems yet. It would have been nice to have it heavier duty and shorter.All in all a very nice device that definitely fills a need.